Authors: Jack Heath
Sorry to hear that, Mr. Arthur. We hope her ear infection clears up soon.
What? I didn’t say she had an ear infection.
It’s right here on the doctor’s certificate.
What doctor’s certificate? What are you talking about?
Her father was staring at her. “I’ll go,” she said. “You’re right. I might make some new friends.”
“Uh, okay,” her father replied, with a puzzled smile. “Good.”
When they got home Ash went to her room and changed into a black halter top, grey skinny jeans, and a pair of ballet flats. The other girls would probably be wearing dresses, but this was the
best she could do. The only dress she owned was the one she’d worn to an ambassador’s house party, at which she’d stolen a 2,600-year-old transcript of
The Iliad
. She
considered it too dangerous to wear the dress in public ever again, and planned to dump it in a charity bin in a couple of weeks.
My third costume today, she thought as she glanced at herself in the mirror. Not bad for someone who’s not interested in clothes.
She walked into the bathroom and ran a brush through her hair, wincing as the bristles tugged at the knots. There was no time for make-up, but although she couldn’t see it, she could still
feel the mud from the mine on her face.
She dipped a towel in warm water and scrubbed at her face with it until her cheeks were pink. Then she rubbed in some moisturizer so her skin wouldn’t dry out and become sore over the
course of what promised to be a long, dull night.
“Dad,” she called. “I’m ready.”
“One, two, three, four, five,” Ash recited into the breathalyser. It beeped, and the security guard withdrew it.
“Go on through,” he said.
“Thanks,” Ash replied. She retrieved her handbag from the other guard, who’d opened her water bottle and sniffed the liquid, but had otherwise left the contents untouched. Then
she walked up the corridor towards the music pounding out of the gymnasium.
At a social two years ago some kids had smuggled in several bottles of booze, and after some visibly clumsy dancing one of them had vomited on the dance floor. In an attempt to keep the next
year’s social alcohol-free, the teachers warned the students that their bags would be searched on the way in.
Instead of not drinking, the students just did it before they arrived. There had been a long line of swaying, slurring, reeking teenagers outside the front entrance. Hence the breathalyser this
year.
And Dad wonders why I don’t hang out with my classmates, Ash thought.
Privately she hoped one of the kids would find another way to break the rules this year. Maybe then the school would cancel these socials altogether.
A dew of glitter coated the carpet outside the door to the gym. Ash took a deep breath – the air smelled of hairspray and sweat – and crossed the threshold.
Lights whirled across the floor from an electric mirror ball up above. Ribbons were looped over the basketball hoops, curving down to the stack of speakers, where a dazed-looking DJ stood in
front of the turntables with his finger resting on a button. The girls and boys stood on opposite sides of the dance floor, bobbing and shuffling self-consciously.
Only girls attended Ash’s school – the boys were from the partner institution, Narahm School for Boys. Ash didn’t know any of them by name, although she’d seen some of
them before, hanging around near the school gates waiting for their girlfriends.
Ash wished Benjamin was here, but he didn’t go to NSB. His mother had insisted that he study at a co-ed school, worried that his lack of social skills would be exacerbated by an all-male
environment. Which, Ash admitted, it probably would have – if there had been anything wrong with his social skills to begin with.
Ash knew she should join a group and dance, blend in, but she was too tired even to pretend to have fun. She sat down on one of the plastic chairs that lined the gym wall, staring into
space.
Despite what she’d told her father, she knew it wasn’t just differing interests that separated her from her classmates. It was also the plethora of secrets that filled her life
– secrets that could get her locked up, or killed.
She and Benjamin had only been working for Hammond Buckland for five months, but they’d been stealing things together for almost three years. And over time, Ash had become more and more
detached from her acquaintances, since she hadn’t been able to chat with them without worrying that they’d figure out her dangerous hobby. And what was the point of having friends she
couldn’t talk to?
Benjamin had always been her best friend. But now, she realized, he’s my
only
friend. Is Dad right? Should I be trying to meet new people?
“Hey, Angie!”
Ash snapped back to reality. A girl was standing in front of her chair – curly black hair, earrings dangling almost to her shoulders.
“How are you?” the girl said. A greeting rather than a question.
“Hi,” Ash said, not bothering to correct the wrong name. “Good, what about—”
The girl interrupted her: “I need you to check if Shane is looking at me,” she said.
Ash peered past her at the group of boys. She had no idea which one was Shane.
“Yeah,” she said. “Definitely.”
The girl raised her eyebrows. “Oh my god. Wow. Thanks.” And then she was gone.
Ash checked her watch. Two more hours of this.
Her eyelids were starting to droop. The chair was hard and stiff, but she was convinced she would fall asleep in it if she stayed there any longer – and that would draw attention.
She heaved herself up. The cafeteria would be open. Maybe a sugary, caffeinated beverage was the answer. She headed for the gymnasium door, eyes low and bleary.
She nearly collided with a boy who was walking in just as she was walking out. He jumped back when he saw her, startled.
“You okay?” Ash said.
“What? Yeah,” he replied. “Sorry.”
There was a pause.
“I didn’t expect – you know,” he said.
“What?” Ash asked, confused.
“You’re just, uh,” he said, “really pretty.”
No one had ever said that to Ash before. She wasn’t sure how to respond. Thank you, perhaps? But that sounded like agreement, which would seem immodest. So should she call him a liar
instead? Surely that couldn’t be the polite option.
The boy looked like he wanted to prolong the conversation, but couldn’t think of anything to say. After a moment, he blushed and ran into the gymnasium.
Ash blinked. That was weird, she thought. I should find out who that was.
But not right now. It would be embarrassing to walk back into the gym, approach a girl, point to the boy and ask for his name – all while he was watching. And anyway, he looked a year or
two older than her, so the girls in her year weren’t likely to know him. Back to the original plan. Sugar and caffeine.
The cafeteria tables were crowded with fidgeting, nervous-looking kids, too shy to brave the dance floor. Most groups had both girls and boys in them. Funny, Ash thought, how they’re happy
to mingle
outside
the gym. I guess they’re not as scared of each other as they are of the music, the lights, the dancing and what it’s all supposed to mean.
She bought a can of an energy drink she’d never heard of, and sat down in a chair identical to the ones in the gym. She sipped, grimaced, and closed her eyes, listening to the conversation
of the girls sitting on her left.
“...no, she only just messaged it to me.”
“She was there? She videoed it?”
“No, someone else sent it to her. Everyone’s messaging it to everyone. Everybody’s got it.”
“No one sent it to me.”
“Yeah, well, I’m showing you now, aren’t I?”
“Oh my god. Is that...oh my
god
!”
“I know, right?”
“Was anyone hurt?”
“It’s night, doofus. Who’s going to be in a library at night?”
“
You’re
a doofus. Shut up. What about, like, security guards?”
Someone was moving towards the empty seat on Ash’s right – a short ginger-haired boy who had dressed in a full-blown tuxedo. Ash avoided eye contact, took another sip from her can
and willed him to go away. Don’t sit here, she thought. This seat is reserved.
“Hey hey,” the ginger boy said.
Ash looked at his face for the first time, and choked on her drink. “Benjamin?”
“Not if anyone asks,” he said, grinning. “Officially I’m Jerome Tanner, footballer, percussionist, and student at Narahm School for Boys.”
“What’s with the tux?”
Benjamin stared at her, as though it was obvious. “It looks good.”
Ash kept her voice low. “What will you do if the real Jerome shows up? You haven’t...poisoned him or anything, have you?”
“Of course not.” Benjamin plucked the can of drink from her hand and sipped it. “Urgh, gross. Of the one thousand and sixty-six students at NSB, nine hundred and eighty-one
have Facebook profiles. Of those profiles, six hundred and thirteen have lazy privacy settings that make them publicly visible. And of
those
, one had a status that read, ‘Screw the
social, can’t be bothered’. Hello Jerome, and here I am.”
He’s clever, Ash thought, but he sure does know it. “You really don’t look like a footballer.”
Benjamin laughed. “If anyone says that, I’ll just say, ‘That’s why I’m so good at it’.”
“I’m not sure that makes sense.”
“I’m not sure your face makes sense.”
Ash stifled a giggle. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad to see you, but why are you here?”
“I couldn’t bear to be apart from you for another second,” Benjamin said, sounding almost serious. “Also, I saw this.”
He pulled a phone out of his pocket, tapped a few keys, and suddenly Ash was watching a video of a bald guy talking in front of the city library.
“What’s this?” she asked.
“Just watch.”
“Turn up the sound. I can’t hear what he’s saying.”
“It’s not important what he’s saying,” Benjamin said.
And then the library exploded.
Well, part of it. Ash recoiled as the side wall blasted outwards and an enormous ball of dust and smoke rolled out into the street. The man’s eyes bugged out as he whirled around to face
the noise. The camera wobbled, turned to the ground, then flitted back up to the library as the cameraman realized that this footage might be valuable. Even with the volume down so low, Ash could
hear screams and the bleating of car horns. A refrigerator tumbled out the hole in the wall and thumped against the ground, spilling jars of mayonnaise and artichokes as it went.
“This footage was taken an hour ago,” Benjamin said. “It’s doing the rounds on the internet – when you next check your email, you’ll find a dozen copies of
the link in your inbox, probably with the subject line ‘Terror attack at city library’. It’s already today’s most-viewed video on YouTube.”
The footage was still going. Ash stared at the fallen fridge, stunned. “What actually happened?”
“The cops haven’t released this yet,” Benjamin said, “but according to my police scanner, an old water main burst in the staff kitchen. The circuit breakers got flooded
and the building lost power for thirty minutes or so. The water drowned the pilot light in the central heating system, and short-circuited the photoresistor safety mechanism that’s supposed
to close the gas valve. So when the electricity came back on, the kitchen had filled with natural gas – which wouldn’t have been a problem except that someone had left a stovetop burner
on.”
“Accidental?” Ash summarized.
“Definitely. There’s no way anyone could have known that tonight was the night that pipe was going to pack it in. And even if they had, switching on the stove and putting out the
pilot light is a pretty unreliable way of making an explosion. Plus, what’s the motive? No one was in the building. They didn’t even destroy that many books, since the explosion
happened so far away from the—”
“So what does this have to do with us?”
“Nothing,” Benjamin said. “Yet. I was just thinking about the hit list.”
Ashley glanced around the room. No one appeared to be listening, or watching them.
Five months ago, when they had tried to rob Hammond Buckland, they’d failed. But instead of punishing them, Buckland gave them a list of one hundred stolen artefacts, complete with their
current locations, their rightful owners, and how much each would pay to recover them. Homer’s
The Iliad
and van Gogh’s ear were just two of the six items they had already
acquired.
“Wasn’t there something in the city library vault that didn’t belong there?” Benjamin was saying slyly. “Something that we have a perfect opportunity to liberate,
now that the explosion has knocked out the alarms? Something that someone would pay sixty-five grand to get back?”
He gestured at the kids at the surrounding tables, gossiping and fiddling with their hair and playing with their phones. “Unless, of course, there’s something else you’d rather
be doing.”
“Let’s go,” Ash said. She was going to have some fun tonight after all.
As she followed Benjamin out, she paused to throw her energy drink in the bin. As she turned back towards the door, she collided with the boy again – the one who’d
complimented her and then fled.
Now that she got a better look at him, she found him quite attractive in a scruffy sort of way. He had kind eyes, and longish hair that seemed to know how much better it looked when messy, and
had therefore resisted all his attempts to neaten it.
But she had work to do. She tried to step around him.
He rested a hand on her arm. “Wait a sec,” he said. “I was thinking, that was kind of rude of me before. So maybe I could take you to a movie sometime? Like, to
apologize.”
“It’s fine,” Ash said, “you weren’t rude. I’ve got to go.”
He beamed. “In that case, maybe we could celebrate my non-rudeness by, say, going to a movie?”
Ash heard echoes of her own voice.
I’ll go. You’re right. I might make some new friends.
Who would have thought that may turn out to be true?
She said, “You’re really keen on that movie.”